BARRINGTON, Ill. & REDMOND, Wash.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--General Electric Company (NYSE: GE), through its healthcare IT business,
and Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) today announced plans to create a
joint venture aimed at helping healthcare organizations and
professionals use real-time, system-wide intelligence to improve
healthcare quality and the patient experience. Upon formation, the new
company will develop and market an open, interoperable technology
platform and innovative clinical applications focused on enabling better
population health management to improve outcomes and the overall
economics of health and wellness.

As healthcare providers and payers around the globe shift from episodic
single-patient care to continuous population management, new
requirements have emerged for integrated care processes, greater insight
and engaging patient experiences. These delivery system reforms,
including a shift toward new payment models, require healthcare
providers to address gaps and integrate data across silos of care
delivery to help enable better care coordination and performance
improvement.

This new venture will combine Microsoft’s deep expertise in building
platforms and ecosystems with GE Healthcare’s experience in clinical and
administrative workflow solutions, empowering healthcare professionals
and organizations with the intelligence and capabilities to respond to
the rapidly evolving and complex healthcare landscape.

“The complementary nature of GE Healthcare’s and Microsoft’s individual
expertise will drive new insights, solutions and efficiencies to further
advance the two companies’ shared vision of a connected, patient-centric
healthcare system, ” said Jeffrey R. Immelt, Chairman and CEO of GE.
“The global healthcare challenges of access, cost and quality of care
delivery are creating a new focus on the performance and accountability
of healthcare delivery systems – in every country, at every level of
care. This venture will demonstrate what is possible when leading
companies with complementary capabilities work together to meet a common
goal.”

The new company will deliver a distinctive, open platform that will give
healthcare providers and independent software vendors the ability to
develop a new generation of clinical applications. The venture will
develop healthcare applications on the platform using in-house
developers and the platform will connect with a wide range of healthcare
IT products, including those from GE Healthcare IT and other vendors.

“High quality affordable healthcare is one of the biggest challenges
facing every nation, but it’s also an area where technology can make a
huge difference,” said Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft. “Combining
Microsoft’s open, interoperable health platforms and software expertise
with GE’s experience and healthcare solutions will create exciting
opportunities for patients and healthcare providers alike. Working
together, GE and Microsoft can help make healthcare systems more
intelligent and cost efficient while improving patient care.”

The two parent companies bring complementary expertise to this new
venture and will contribute intellectual property, including:

The long-term vision of the venture is to create new value by offering a
healthcare performance management suite that includes many of these
products.

In addition to the new joint venture, GE Healthcare and Microsoft will
each maintain a strong presence in the healthcare IT industry, as both
parent organizations will continue to sell other products and services
to healthcare organizations around the globe.

“Improving the quality of healthcare through innovative collaboration is
a goal that we share with GE Healthcare and Microsoft. Working together
with others to identify new ways to improve health outcomes and drive
down cost is a hallmark of our patient-care philosophy,” said C. Michel
Harper, M.D., Executive Dean for Practice, Mayo Clinic. “We’re pleased
to see healthcare IT companies embrace this same idea and come together
in new ways. We look forward to seeing the progress this new endeavor
will bring in medicine.”

"Intermountain Healthcare and GE have a strong history and partnership
in developing and advancing transformational healthcare information
technologies," stated Charles S. Sorenson, MD, president and CEO of
Intermountain Healthcare. "Our common vision is driving powerful
advancements in healthcare and improving the clinical work process by
making real-time information available at the point of care. We look
forward to continuing our efforts to further these principles, achieving
our combined objectives, and putting these important technologies into
practice."

The new company’s products and services will provide the information and
insight required to help address many critical problems in the
healthcare system today, including:

Healthcare Associated Infections – In the US alone, an estimated 1.7
million healthcare associated infections (HAI) occur annually, resulting
in $35 billion in additional healthcare costs1,2
and the loss of nearly 100,000 lives3 . By pulling together
data from disparate IT systems, identifying those patients most at risk
for a given HAI, and surfacing guidelines and protocols within provider
workflow, the solutions will enable healthcare organizations to more
effectively deploy their resources and deliver better care at lower
costs.

Chronic Disease Management – According to the Centers for Disease
Control, about 133 million Americans (nearly half of all adults) live
with at least one chronic illnessand most chronic diseases
require a lifetime of ongoing care.4 To help patients and
their physicians work together more efficiently to manage chronic
conditions, the platform and applications will support the sharing of
data from at-home medical devices (such as blood pressure cuffs, scales,
glucometers) with caregivers to facilitate better tracking of chronic
conditions, coordination of treatment schedules, management of
medication regimens and timely interventions.

The new venture complements the existing offerings from both parent
companies and is expected to yield job growth in its first five years of
existence. It will operate globally, offering interoperability platforms
and application solutions targeting both healthcare providers and
payers. Michael J. Simpson, vice president and general manager at GE
Healthcare IT, will serve as the company’s CEO.

The new company, which has yet to be named, will be headquartered near
the Microsoft campus in Redmond, Wash., with significant presence in
Salt Lake City, Utah and additional cities around the world.

Launch of the new joint venture is subject to customary conditions,
including regulatory approvals, and is expected in the first half of
2012.

ABOUT GE HEALTHCARE:

GE Healthcare provides transformational medical technologies and
services that are shaping a new age of patient care. Our broad expertise
in medical imaging and information technologies, medical diagnostics,
patient monitoring systems, drug discovery, biopharmaceutical
manufacturing technologies, performance improvement and performance
solutions services help our customers to deliver better care to more
people around the world at a lower cost. In addition, we partner with
healthcare leaders, striving to leverage the global policy change
necessary to implement a successful shift to sustainable healthcare
systems.

Our “healthymagination” vision for the future invites the world to join
us on our journey as we continuously develop innovations focused on
reducing costs, increasing access and improving quality around the
world. Headquartered in the United Kingdom, GE Healthcare is a unit of
General Electric Company (NYSE: GE). Worldwide, GE Healthcare employees
are committed to serving healthcare professionals and their patients in
more than 100 countries. For more information about GE Healthcare, visit
our website at www.gehealthcare.com.

Microsoft is committed to improving health around the world through
software innovation. Over the past 16 years, Microsoft has steadily
increased its investments in health, with a focus on addressing the
challenges of health providers, health and social services
organizations, payers, consumers and life sciences companies worldwide.
Microsoft closely collaborates with a broad ecosystem of partners and
develops its own powerful health solutions, such as Microsoft Amalga and
Microsoft HealthVault. Together, Microsoft and its industry partners are
working to deliver health solutions that enable better health outcomes
for more people.

For more information, news and perspectives from Microsoft, please
visit the Microsoft News Center at http://www.microsoft.com/news.
Web links, telephone numbers and titles were correct at time of
publication, but may have changed. For additional assistance,
journalists and analysts may contact Microsoft’s Rapid Response Team or
other appropriate contacts listed at http://www.microsoft.com/news/contactpr.mspx.

FORWARD-LOOKING STATEMENTS

This press release contains "forward-looking statements" within the
meaning of Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and
Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended and such
forward-looking statements are made pursuant to the safe harbor
provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Such
statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause
future results to differ materially from the forward-looking statements.
You should consider these factors in evaluating the statements herein,
and not rely on such statements. The forward-looking statements in this
release are made as of the date hereof and we undertakes no obligation
to update such statements.